


Everything's Golden

by disgustinglyperfect



Category: Newsies!: the Musical - Fierstein/Menken, Tuck Everlasting - Miller/Tysen/Shear & Federle
Genre: Cross Over, Gen, One Shot, Platonic Female/Male Relationships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-21
Updated: 2016-11-21
Packaged: 2018-09-01 06:23:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,931
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8612680
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/disgustinglyperfect/pseuds/disgustinglyperfect
Summary: Winnie Foster goes to New York in the summer just before her seventeenth birthday and meets a certain newsboy.





	

“You go ahead, Mother. I’d like to see more of the city.” Winnie turns to the woman in front of her.

“Winnifred Foster, I am not letting you walk around New York by yourself. It is almost sunset. Do you know what could happen to a young girl such as yourself?” Mrs. Foster scowls, turning her hat up to look at her daughter.

“What if Hugo came with me? His station is just down the street, and I haven’t seen him since he was promoted and moved to the city.” Winnie says, giving her mother a pleading look.

Her mother purses her lips and folds her arms, staring at Winnie. After a minute, she sighs. “Alright, but you’d better be home before dark. And no running off! Your seventeenth birthday is tomorrow, and it’s an important day.”

“I won’t, mother!” Winnie says, already strolling away, smiling at her mother’s choice of words. If she only knew.

Winnie walks for about a block, until she knows that her mother can’t see her, and then she turns down an alleyway. In reality, Hugo’s station was in upper Manhattan, above Times Square, but her mother didn’t need to know that. Sometimes Mrs. Foster was insufferable, and Winnie needed a break.

Winnie emerges on another street, this one a little more lively and crowded. She turns to the left, where a crowd of people are gathered around a shouting young man.

“Excuse me, miss, we was wonderin’ if you could help us out.” A man taps Winnie’s shoulder, and she turns around. Two young men who look strikingly similar are standing much too close for her comfort. She takes a step back.

“Me and my brother here was hopin’ you could direct us to 3rd Street.” The man on the left says.

Winnie turns her head. A street sign beside her displays 2nd Street. Winnie turns back to the men.

“Yes, it’s on the other side of these buildings.” She says, pointing to her right.

“Perfect.” The man on the right grins an evil grin and picks Winnie up by the waist.

“Excuse me! Put me down!” Winnie exclaims.

The men turn into the alleyway she came from.

“Help! These men are abducting me! Help!” Winnie shrieks, abandoning all of the manners and etiquette that had been drilled into her head. People stop and stare, but no one does anything.

A fist flies into Winnie’s peripheral vision and connects with the face attached to the pair of arms around her waist. She’s dropped and falls to her back, dirtying her skirts and hitting her tailbone in the process. A scrawny boy in a blue shirt and grey cap swings his fist and attacks the men. They swing back, but he dodges. One of them slips on a set of brass knuckles and clocks the boy in the cheekbone. Winnie gasps. The boy grins and swings back at the men.

A policeman blows his whistle, and the two men straighten their fedoras and ties, and stroll away.

The boy with the grey cap holds out his hand to Winnie. She stares up at him. His hazel eyes glint in the sun.

“Come on, we gotta go!” He hisses. Winnie takes his hand and lets him haul her to her feet. She gathers her skirts, and ignoring the pain in her lower back, follows the boy as he runs further into the alley. He grabs her wrist and pulls her into a side street, then another, and another, until they’ve found a dead end.

The boy motions to a ladder above them, and helps her reach it. She climbs, still feeling the throbbing pain in her lower back. Suddenly, Winnie is standing on a rooftop. She can see the top of every building, and the sun setting in the west.

“Take a seat.” The boy says behind her, making her jump.

Winnie perches tenderly on the edge of the roof. She watches the boy as he examines the fresh cut on his cheekbone in a shard of broken mirror.

“Do you need help? My mother taught me how to take care of bruises.” Winnie offers, taking a handkerchief out of her skirt pocket.

The boy grins, blood trickling down his cheek. “It won’t be the first black eye I’ve had this month.” His grin fades. “Those damn Delancey brothers. I’m sorry they bothered ya. They’s usually well behaved.”

Winnie shakes her head. “It’s quite alright. I’m sure my mother won’t be pleased when she finds out, but I can handle her.”

“Well, I won’t tell her. Promise.” The boy puts his hand over his heart. Winnie giggles and the boy smiles.

“I’m Winnifred, by the way. Winnie for short.” She holds out her hand.

The boy shakes her hand. “Jack Kelly, Jack for short. When do ya gotta get back to your mother?”

“Before dark.” Winnie sighs, gazing out over the city.

Jack grabs her wrist and pulls her onto the floor of the roof as a whistle blows underneath them.

“I think you’d better lie low here for a little bit.” Jack says after a minute, helping Winnie stand. “How’s your back?”

Winnie suddenly becomes aware of the throbbing pain in her lower back. It hits her with such a force that she stumbles and grabs Jack’s arm. He helps her sit against the low wall and gives her a threadbare blanket to cushion herself.

“I’ll see if Jacobi’s has any ice. Don’t move a muscle.” Jack says, before he mock-salutes and climbs down the ladder over the side of the roof.

Winnie leans her head back against the wall and closes her eyes for a minute. Why is she letting this keep her here? She’s never let an injury stop her before, even when she sprained her ankle after she fell out of Jesse’s tree.

Oh yeah. Tomorrow’s her birthday. She has to make up her mind before the train arrives back in New Hampshire.

The breeze picks up and a piece of parchment blows across the rooftop. Winnie fights the searing pain in her tailbone and stands, reaching her hand out and leaning over the edge of the roof. She catches the paper, but finds herself face-to-face with open about fifty feet of open air, with New York City pavement directly below her.

“Winnie, I- hey!” Jack calls from behind her. “What’re ya doin’?”

He pulls her back up and helps her sit on the edge of the roof. As he wraps a small bag of ice in a tea towel, Winnie unfolds the piece of paper. There’s a rough charcoal sketch of a dark room, with only a small, barred window and a rat in the corner.

 “Where’d ya get that?” Jack asks coldly. Winnie meets his eyes. They’re dark and stormy. He’s angry.

“It blew across the roof and I caught it before it went over the edge.” Winnie scowls. “I apologize if it offended you.” She holds out the paper.

Jack takes it and rolls it back up, then stuffs it into a pipe at the corner of the roof. He hands her the ice wrapped in a towel and they sit in silence for a minute.

“You’re really good, you know.” Winnie mutters. Jack glances at her and sighs.

“That one you saw was of the Refuge. It’s a jail for kids an’ it stinks. There’s three kids to a bed, an’ rats everywhere.” Jack plays with his cap. “Just like the rest of this city.”

“Then why don’t you leave?” Winnie asks.

Jack laughs bitterly. “I wish I could. As soon as I have enough money, I’m gonna buy me a one-way ticket to Santa Fe.”

Winnie looks over the city. A purple sky is fading in. “What’s in Santa Fe?”

Jack shrugs. “Clean air. Open space. Seein’ more than fifty feet in front of ya.”

“So are you running _to_ Santa Fe or are you running _away_ from New York?” Winnie asks. “Because there’s a difference.”

“What about you, huh? What are you looking for here?” Jack counters playfully.

Winnie smiles thoughtfully. “An answer.”

“An answer to what?”

“It’s complicated.” Winnie shrugs. “Can I ask you a question?”

Jack nods.

“If you could live forever and travel the whole world, would you?” Winnie asks.

“What exactly does ‘live forever’ mean?” Jack scowls.

“As in… stop aging.”

Jack pauses, then shrugs. “I dunno. I think that after I saw Santa Fe, I'd miss the boys here. Everything I wanted to see would get kinda borin’, ya know? Plus, I like the pressure of havin' this big dream. I think the point of life is that ya only got a limited time to do everythin’ ya want.”

Winnie nods. “I just.... I need to figure out what I want to do before tomorrow, when I go back to New Hampshire.”

“What’s tomorrow?”

“My seventeenth birthday.”

“Hey, I’m seventeen too!” Jack grins. Winnie smiles, but then her smile drops as she remembers her mother.

“Here, take this drawing. If you still need your answer, look at it on your train.” Jack hands her a rolled-up piece of paper. “Just… ain’t it better to try to beat the time limit rather than be bored forever?”

Winnie nods. "You’re very smart, Jack Kelly.”

Jack smiles. “Now that’s something I don’t hear every day.”

“Really? Maybe you should be communicating your big ideas a little more.” Winnie suggests.

“Yeah…” Jack trails off. “Maybe I should.”

“The sun is almost gone! I need to get back to my mother before dark or she’ll have my head!” Winnie exclaims.

“I’ll walk ya. Is your hotel close?” Jack asks, taking the blanket and ice from her and adjusting his cap. She briefly sees his dark curls flopping out from under his hat before he smashes it back down onto his head.

“Yes, it’s on the corner of 4th and 3rd.” Winnie says, turning to the ladder.

“That’s only a couple blocks away.” Jack says. They climb down the fire escapes and touch down safely on the pavement in the alleyway. Jack leads her out of the maze of side streets and out onto the street. It’s cleared out, with less people milling around.

“Thank you for listening to me, even though I just met you today.” Winnie says.

“No problem. You seem like a good girl. An’ the more people I can help, the better.” Jack says. “That’s what I think life is about. Helping people and doin’ things the right way. I may be just a newsie, but I think we’re just as much a part of the newspaper as any reporter or editor.”

Winnie nods. “Are you the leader of the newsboys?”

“You betcha.” Jack replies.

They stop on the stoop of the hotel. Winnie shivers, already craving the soft, warm sheets of her hotel bed.

“This is the address of the Newsboy’s Lodge. If you’re ever in New York just ask for Jack Kelly.” Jack hands Winnie a torn piece of paper. She takes it and smiles.

“Thank you, Jack Kelly.” She stands on her tiptoes and plants a light kiss on his cheek. “You take care of yourself, alright?”

Jack nods, watching her walk into the hotel. “Hey, Winnie?”

She turns back to look at him.

“I hope you find your answer.” Jack calls.

Winnie smiles. “I think I already have.”

**~ &~ TWO WEEKS LATER ~&~**

_Dear Jack,_

_My friend in New York sent me this article from two days ago and I found a familiar face in the picture. Congratulations on the strike! I hope you succeed!_

**NEWSIES STOP THE WORLD**

_Sincerely,_

_Winnie Foster_


End file.
